Sunday, January 25, 2009

The top shows the piece with the snow layer sort of done. I used Armour Etch to get a "drifty" effect.--tons and tons of it, in a bath tub....it took days to get through the flash. But it can make a nice wifty, drifty, cloudy nebula kind of look which I thought would be good for snow. I have a feeling that I could get somewhere if I actually tried some experiments. For instance--a lighter color flash might have been a better choice and preserved more of the brushstrokes the acid makes.

The next photo shows the piece at the same stage as the previous--but I have overlaid the negative for the branches and set down the snowflakes (both of which will be on another layer of glass). The branches won't be densely black when I am finished! (and yes--it doesn't look like a negative but it is--its for a photo sandblast stencil--from Rayzist!) You will be able to see the snowflakes and the figure much clearer.

This piece was inspired by this Klaus Nomi video--"The Cold Song" by Henry Purcell

You will be so very, very sorry you asked about music. On so very many levels!! So buckle your seatbelts...

First of all—I mostly listen to NPR (National Public Radio) not because I just adore hearing about the economy in Burkina Faso or organic gardening...but because the voices of the friendly and non-threatening talking people keep me company. Between that and Facebook, my hermit lifestyle is 100% enabled. As for music in the studio—I have a series of mix CDs which are all for the purposes of me singing along. Loud. Very loud. I belt ‘em out, baby! This is the real reason I can’t work with assistants. It would violate the Geneva Convention.

My tastes are truly eclectic and more than following any one artist for the duration of their career, I am more apt to like a few songs by a huge range of artists. If you actually read or skim the list below (which is every artist on my ipod) be aware I have a lot of single songs by an artist and would be very, very happy to hear nothing more from them ever again.In general my taste runs from hipster approved obscurata to guilty pleasures that will horrify you. “Gloria” by Laura Branigan, anyone? Original Cast Soundtrack to “Hair”? I dare you to hate me for this!!! Basically, my taste was formed in the early 1980’s. I am a dyed in the wool New Wave/Punk fan. My favorite album of all time is probably Gang Of Four’s “Entertainment”. Perhaps the most perfect song I've ever heard is "Heroes" by David Bowie. I love Mission of Burma, Iggy Pop, Devo, Patti Smith, the B-52’s, The English Beat, Talking Heads, and Joy Division et al. A little later, I was into Gun Club, Sisters of Mercy dark stuff like that...later still Guided By Voices, Palace, Mark Lanegan.I love classical and country too! Mozart, Debussy, Hank Williams and Patsy Cline—bring ‘em on! Folk music like Pete Seeger? Great stuff! I like a good sea shanty too.My passions lately run the gamut from Sufjan Stevens to Godspeed You Black Emperor! And lately I’ve been listening to a LOT of Macha.I have two musician friends whom I think are geniuses—Andy Prieboy and David E. Williams. You would do yourselves a world of good by buying lots of their music!Also—I like to work out at the gym and the music for that is necessarily very loud and fast. So my ipod has three main mixes: “fun” “superfun” and “spaghetti werewolf” which is funner than superfun. At the gym, I am inclined to like very rude, rowdy metal, industrial and dance music. Ministry, KMFDM, Metallica The Jesus Lizard, LCD Soundsystem that type of thing. I’ve beaten my personal best on an elliptical trainer thanks to KMFDM.

From the press release:"The phrase “pretty is as pretty does” is an idiom typically used to describe a beautiful girl with a nasty disposition—she may look pretty, but it doesn’t follow that she acts pretty. Pretty is as Pretty Does, a group exhibition organized by Phillips Director Laura Steward Heon, takes its inspiration from this phrase and features work that suffuse base, even obscene content in otherworldly beauty. The artists whose works are included in this exhibition have, with exquisite care and cunning charm, made objects that glitter with abject ugliness. In all of the works, an effervescent prettiness and sneering nastiness circle around each other, and both qualities are magnified by their combination."

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Someone asked me recently if my dreams were anything like my work./ In general, no, they are bo-ring! But here's two notable exceptions...

About four others and myself were in a small airplane. We were actors and being filmed. At first one of them was Courtney Love, but then she was a girl I grew up with, although that was not a major feature of the plot of this dream. The airplane was having difficulty getting any lift and we were flying dangerously close to buildings, etc. The pilot didn’t say anything to us, so for a while, we thought this was part of the movie, or somehow just normal. Nevertheless we were all pretty nerve wracked and I kept thinking, “I will never fly again after this!” and “Why doesn’t he just land on a roof and let us off?” So then he brought the plane down on a roof--but he didn’t let us out or tell us anything. Instead he got out and was fiddling around with the tail of the airplane. I was thinking--”Haven’t all those small plane crashes lately been because of tail problems?” He still didn’t tell us anything.So then it was “later” and myself and the other passengers were no longer on the plane, but wandering around a residential neighborhood and wondering if we should head back to the plane, where the expectation was that the pilot would have tried to fix the tail and we would finish the film shoot. I kept saying, “Why don’t we just skip out on this guy? After all, he’s suicidal because his boyfriend just left him.” So we practiced hiding in the alley next to a house--but we all kind of knew that we were too responsible to just disappear--even though I certainly felt our lives were at stake! Finally, FINALLY! the pilot shows up and walks right up to me, (because all of the sudden I was the unofficial leader of the passengers) and he says: “Well, it’s up to you guys. You can come with me and trust your good luck necklaces”(which all of the sudden I noticed we were all wearing) “or you can just skip the whole thing”

Then I woke up thinking “suicidal pilot, suicidal pilot...”(This dream happened right before the 9/11 oddly enough)

A long, epic dream:I was in a movie about a troubled family. Kevin Spacey was playing the father. I was the middle daughter of three and there was also a younger brother. I was dorky and naive, compared to my older sister who seemed worldly and sophisticated to me. This was an exquisitely sweet twist on the role of “weaker twin” which I have been in a long line of recurrent dreams.I don’t remember the whole first and middle parts of the dream--but I do remember them as being complicated and dramatic. The first part I recall is being in my older sister’s room. I was looking at her possessions and was in awe of how she’d gotten herself into such a messy, troubled situation. She was getting kicked out of the house possibly for being a junkie--but it wasn’t clear. It could also have been because we were so cramped in the little house we lived in. But while I was in her room, I looked up and realized, we lived in a gigantic lighthouse tower with hundreds of rooms--one on top of another! Almost all of them unoccupied. “I'll show you the room I’d like to have, if I had my choice” my older sister told me and all of the sudden it seemed our parents had a big, big secret what with all those rooms that I never even realized were there. We went upstairs, knowing it was “wrong” and that we didn’t want to get caught. The room she’d chosen was an old abandoned library. The windows were all covered up with paper, but it seemed like if one just ripped that off, there would be a lot of light in that room. At this moment, we were found by our parents--who’d brought our other sister and brother up with them. We understood that our father had no choice but to kill us all. There was something inevitable about this and I felt no anger at him--although it was also horrifying. We didn’t try to escape, or anything. We all left the tower and were out on the lawn. He killed my older sister and then cradled me in his arms very tenderly and drove home a huge needle filled with some heart-stopping drug right into my jugular. (There was something ironic about this method, considering my sister’s circumstances) It was suddenly obvious again that this was only a movie, so I played dead and pulled my hood over my face. He was singing me a lullaby comparing the sinking of a ship to the death of a swan. I wanted to tell him to sing me “Madeleine Mary” but I didn’t interrupt--not just because I was “dead”, but because being silenced felt good, romantic. And I was thinking that he was like the captain going down with his ship--or maybe he wasn’t brave enough to do that, but I still understood and loved him and that was beautiful.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

So what’s going on here and can I possibly put it down in words?! Yes, Peeps, a specific demo on a head. I ran out of blue glass for the piece in the earlier technical post and started this instead, and YOU can benefit!My intention was to repeat the process in the head in the “Stained Glass Lesson” post. But try as I might, the material always talks back. I am using a red that is slightly lighter and this will make the color very different when its done...at least I think so.I am not finished with the actual head yet, so as I post I am still working on it. It could all get flushed down the vortex of heck, for all I know...

The first photo, god willing I load them in the correct order, is my sketch.

Photo #2 –Left side: are the pieces of red on clear and blue on clear I cut for the head, unsandblasted. The right hand side is the two pieces very lightly blasted (just enough to get a frosted finish) and the red plate is then marked up with a razor pt permanent marker. The final image in this series has a ruler for scale, FYI.I am not going to do anything to the blue for a good long while...I have found its easier to conceptualize one layer at a time. This prevents my brain from exploding.

Photo #3 shows the head in sequence.The first head has been painted with a mixture of red for flesh mixed with stencil black (look at the photo of my palette for proportions) and then ALL the excess is wiped off so it’s almost exactly the same red as before. (It might be hard to see in these photos because the color isn’t all that accurate.) So why do I do this paint-on and wipe-off step???? I’m not sure...I swear, it makes a difference—subtle, but visible. On top of this, I paint the trace line (for those who don’t know what a trace line is: I am using a liner brush to trace the marker lines with thin, calligraphy-like strokes.)Then I fire it. 1210F and down. No ramps, no soaking, just pure steel nerves, baby!The next four images in photo #3 are of engraving using both the flexible shaft engraver and a diamond file (see previous post for info). The image shows how I gradually remove material to make the highlight values in the face. I use the flex shaft to engrave hard edge lines and pure white areas—and the diamond file for tones.

Photo #4 is how it looked when I felt done enough to stop. The careful observer would note that if I went on any more there might be nothing left! Yes, I have done that! Engraving is “the craftsmanship of risk” to quote David Pye. If you’re not on the verge of disaster are you really alive? Get back to me with your one-page essays next week. The blue now has a marker drawing on it as well. This is because at some point, I intend to engrave and file it as well...just not yet! It is possible to be ridiculously accurate drawing this plate over the red one but it takes practice since the layers are flopped, and the glass has some depth. You will need to be slow and careful if you want an insane level of accuracy. Which I do.

Photo #5 shows the head with another coat of paint. Unfired. I expect it to lose some of its dynamism in the oven but I will put it back in firing #3.

That’s all I’ve done for now so stay tuned...same Bat Channel, same Bat Time.....

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Diamond files are made for lampworkers and glass blowers--I think to smooth the sharp parts that occur from breaking off of blowpipes and the like. But these amazing li'l suckers will grind down flash too! Why not? Diamond abrasive is diamond abrasive and it scratches the heck outta glass, whether or not its attached to power source. The only difference between sandblasting and filing is one is powered by squirrels on a treadmill in your basement and the other is powered by YOU! (OK, there's more differences than that, but you get the picture).

I have noticed blue flash files with the smoothest tones. Red is more inclined to be less tonal.

I use the roughest grit--120, methinks. The smallest file is 1/4" and you can shape the tip with an exacto or sandpaper for extra insane minute attention to detail...always desirable to the Militant Ornamentalist!

Monday, January 5, 2009

I wanna start out by saying that writing about specific techniques makes me feel like I’m “dancing about cooking” or something like that. One MAJOR caveat is that, in my experience, a description is harder to follow than a live demo and a live demo is no substitute for hands on experience with the actual materials—generally when I demo, even to artists with stained glass experience, its all a little confusing until they get their hands on the actual glass and can learn from first hand experience.

Second of all—I don’t have set plans and I don’t know how its gonna look when I’m done, I like to experiment and dammitol, so should you!

The head, hands and foot are three layers of flash glass.Lamberts Red on Clear B (SA Bendheim catalog #20-1001R/CL B)Saint Just Blue on Clear FL-110 (this is a VERY light blue flash—lighter than Lambert’s 1006 BL/CL A)The pink is a DESAG gp/cl which is no longer being made. I would substitute the lightest Lamberts gp/cl.

I worked on the red/clear layer first—I don’t have the layers planned out in advance. I tend to do most of the image on the red because it is very stable and predictable in the kiln. But I don’t have any set ways of doing this stuff...its always subject to change.

1. First I sandblasted the red. I didn’t use a stencil and all I did was set the pressure low enough to frost the surface. I didn’t remove any red.

2. Then I drew the face on with a razor point permanent marker.

3. I mixed up some glass stainer’s colors. In this case about 50/50 Red For Flesh and Stencil Black. I painted the surfaces of the sandblasted glass and then wiped ALL the excess off with a paper towel. So everything that didn’t stick from the natural tooth of the sandblasting gets wiped off. This leaves the glass only a hair darker red than before. This piece is the first time this particular color combination didn’t suck big time and have to be trashed...At this stage, you can see the pen drawing again and I went in with a liner/tracer brush (right now I use a #2 white nylon) and traced the pen lines I had drawn before with glass paint.

4. Then I fired the pieces. I fire at F 1210. I just go up as fast as possible (my kiln takes 20-25 mins), turn it off when it hits 1210, crack it to F. 1050 and then stick a tiny chunk of firebrick in the oven to keep it cracked about ½” and turn a fan on to vent it out my exhaust window. It cools in about two hours.

5. When the pieces came out, I went into them with a flex shaft engraver. I use diamond ball-shaped burrs, and cold water. On the light table so I can see what I’m doing! And I keep some bath towels around to mop up the mess. SO--I ground the highlights—where her skin is the whitest. NOT VERY MUCH mind you, as one can’t undo a subtractive process! But don’t be a big wuss about it, either. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

6. Now here’s my big secret...listen carefully! After the engraver, I went into the piece and used a 3-M Starlite Diamond File (1/4”—the black one which has the roughest abrasive. You will the roughest as there’s nothing powering this tool but your poor elbow and wrist!)I use the file to make the shading. Its very delicate, subtle and tonally rich. Gorgeous. And it’s hard as all heck on your arms!I hold the file as parallel to the surface being worked as possible. Or course, as with ALL diamond tools, lots of cold water is necessary to cool the diamonds and towels so the water doesn’t flow into your light table and electrocute you.

7. Then I paint some of the shadows in. I used a mixture that was much darker—so a greater proportion of stencil black is added. I don’t use gum arabic. Mainly because I ran out in, like, 1985 and haven’t gotten any more....I fired it again and went back in to make the shadows richer. I forget how many firings but I think only three.

8. The blue layer was an experiment. Usually I would remove the color in such a way that it complimented the red layer. I.e. so there would be blue where there was no red etc. In this case, I tried to remove color to echo how I did it on the red. I was very pleased with the results!! So it’s basically the same idea as the red without the paint. Sandblast, engrave, file till your arms fall off.

9. I fire polished the blue at F 1400. Don’t do this!!!! It’s too high. She looks like she has a 5:00 shadow from the texture in the blue glass at a certain angle. F 1350 would have been more than fine....maybe even F 1300...OK try F 1325!

10. The pink layer is the same as the blue but NO fire polish as it strikes. That is why this layer is the bottom. On the back side of the pink (the NON flash side) I engraved the veins with the flex shaft. I then rubbed some transparent aqua oil paint into the grooves to make them bluish.

So that’s the skin.

The puffy coat is two layers of blue. The bottom layer is sandblasted lightly (to make the toothy surface that’s oh-so-easy to paint on) and painted with stencil black. The top layer was a darker blue (Lambert’s 1006-BL/CL B) that was also lightly sandblasted, more heavily engraved and then filed a bit.

The yellow and red drapery coming out from the coat is plain yellow Lambert’s Antique (72xx, I think) that, once again, I sandblasted to make it paint-able. I screwed it up because the first layer was brown (like on the face) but it looked like crap and I eventually went over it with all black. I filed the highlights into the paint because it looks so damned good! The red layer is a photo sandblast stencil. Easy peasy and heavy fire polish.

Any questions class? Please ask in comments I would be happy to answer!!!e ask in comments I would be happy to answer!!!

From my vast, vast, VAST archive of images. I'm sure I have more on this theme...finding them is a problem--a big huge, vast, vast problem.

This is for Jessica--not that she asked but I figured what the heck...doesn't everyone need to see a lady (dead or otherwise) riding on a giant reptile every now and then? Now who wants to see the turtle one?

Sunday, January 4, 2009

I have a long technical description to post--but its so long I need to learn the secret of hiding blocks of text in HTML...working on it, working on it!!!! If I can't figure it out I'll post it anyway.

Meanwhile, enjoy this picture of New Years Days at the Philadelphia Mummers Parade! It's me, a mummer (who was a really nice guy!) and my friend JoAnn.

Thursday, January 1, 2009

OK so Miss Fidget wants to see the alligator piece (Here it is--its called "The Talk" 2008).

Tara wants to see my daily life. This, I can try--I don't usually document things in that way and also my routine existence is really super boring!! But...if I do something of interest, I will post about it. As it happens I started this blog during a real lull--coming after last summer and fall when I was ridiculously super busy doing stuff that actually wasn't boring! (First I taught at the Pittsburgh Glass Center, then I went to the Glass Art Society Conference in Portland, the American Glass Guild Conference in Cherry Hill, NJ, then I taught at Toyama City Institute of Glass (TIGA) in Toyama, Japan.
When I got back I had about 60 days to complete my first ever permanent, architectural pice "Seeing Is Believing" for the new Museum of Arts and Design on Columbus Circle in New York City.
Then things slowed down and I started this blog.)

Bacci Galoupi suggests images of student work--I have TONS of images but I think I should get their permission to post it, but for now check out the work of the TIGA students. He also suggest images of my bug collection (uh? What bug collection? I do, however have a taxidermy collection and lots of bones and other wunderkammery type stuff...which I can post at some point but MEANWHILE Libby Soffer and Roberta Fallon of Artblog have a Flickr set up from when they came over for lunch a while back.

And JX wants me to show in England (me too!!!) and to talk some about technique. Okie dokie--I shall include some of that in the future. JX--I taught at Northlands in Scotland in 2007. AMAZING experience. Maybe someday they will invite me back!
It will be a challenge to talk about technique but I really want to share that type of info so I shall do so.

PLEASE keep letting me know how "Late breaking Noose" can serve you by leaving me comments! THANKS and happy new year to you all!